ROUGHLY EDITED COPY LUTHERAN WORSHIP 2 38.LW2 Captioning provided By: Caption First, Inc. P.O. Box 1924 Lombard, IL 60148 ******** This text is being provided in a rough draft format. Communication Access Realtime Translation (CART) is provided in order to facilitate communication accessibility and may not be a totally verbatim record of the proceedings. ******** >> PAUL: Will you share with us some of the other pastoral implications of the changes that take place in the liturgy. >> DR. ARTHUR JUST: Thank you for this question, Paul, because it's going to allow me to summarize a little bit of what I've said so far about this medieval period. I have already referred to many of them when I had that long, you know, response to the question concerning the changes that did come about because of the barbarian invasions and this whole medieval period. But let's just think a little bit here in summary about some of the implications of this for the liturgy and how that might impact us today so that we can see some of its application today. The number one thing, and I've already spent enough time on this, but it certainly is worth repeating is the separation between clergy and laity and the fact that we are now on a foundation of works righteousness within the church�s life. But some of the practical ramifications of that are ones that I think we need think about. One of the big ones, and for me, this is one of the biggest ones, is the in frequent communion of the laity. One of the joys of being a pastor in the last twenty-four years is that we have seen an increase in many congregations of every Sunday communion or at least people recognizing the need to come to communion as often as it is offered. This is, in a sense, among us in the generations that are going to church, a somewhat new phenomenon. And this is something that I think we can rejoice in. Part of that infrequent communion that was going on in the medieval church fell kind of washed over into the Reformation and has been with us that whole time. So I think you can see that there is something that happened thousand plus years ago that we are still just beginning to come out of one thousand years later. And so I think there is a pastoral implication that we're trying to address in our church in, I think, in a very salutary way. Another implication is the hearing of the word of God. The fact that they could not hear the word of God or that they were listening to fables and legends instead of the word of God shows us how important it is for people to hear the word of God. It's remarkable, perhaps, for us to think about going to church and not hearing the word of God. But the fact of the matter is, in many of the churches today, and I don't want to speak necessarily about our own Lutheran churches although it is happening there, but in many Christian churches, very little of the word of God is read. I am always astounded by that when I visit other traditions that�s it�s only a few verses here and there. And is used oftentimes in a way that is unrelated to the rest of what is going on. This shows us how important the word of God is, how central it is. And if you think back on the history of the early Christian communities, the word of God is central, hearing the Old Testament, hearing the epistle, hearing the gospel, seeing how they work together. Perhaps, many of you don't know up until the nineteenth century the Old Testament lesson wasn't really read in Lutheran churches. It's only since the mid-19th century that we've had the Old Testament read in our churches, and even our old hymnal, the Lutheran Hymnal doesn't necessarily call for the Old Testament lesson. So hearing the Old Testament again is kind of a new thing even though it's an old thing. And it's a wonderful thing. So the hearing of the word of God is central, and Luther did get this right and bringing that back to the people is one of the great contributions of Luther to the church. The idea of the sacrifice of the mass, this is, of course, what I said before was one of the major reasons Luther rebelled against what he was experiencing as a Roman Catholic in his church. I mean, it was indulgences, but many Luther scholars today will say that it was the sacrifice of the mass that led to the Reformation as much as anything. What this calls us to remember is that it's not us who are doing for God, it's God who's doing for us. And that's why it's so important for us to remember that biblical theology of worship, that we always begin with God as the giver, the giver of gifts, and that we are there to receive the gifts, and that we don't work our way back into heaven by means of our liturgical, you know, participation or by the fact that we join with the priest in offering up this unbloody sacrifice. This is a very important point, and perhaps the best way to illustrate it is this: when they talk about the sacrifice of the mass, the sacrifice there is a verb. They are doing something. They are sacrificing. We certainly are not against the fact that there is a sacrifice there, but it's a noun. And what is present there is Christ's sacrifice on the cross in, with, and under bread and wine which we eat and drink for our salvation. And so what we have seen happen, in light of the medieval period, is the restoration of that wonderful doctrine of the scriptures concerning the Lord's Supper that is so fundamental to the way in which we understand the supper. Alongside of that, and I didn�t mention this before because I thought perhaps I mentioned too many things, but this is the place to talk about it. Many of you are familiar that for a long time in the church's history, people received communion in only one kind, that they would only receive the bread and not the wine. Now, there were a number of theological reasons for that. During the medieval time, you begin to see within the church and within the culture a doubting or a questioning of the real presence of Christ. That doesn't start just at the Reformation; that starts at the medieval period. And so what the church did, in a sense, to protect the real presence is they developed the doctrine of transubstantiation where the bread and wine now turn completely into only body and blood. So it's no longer bread and wine; its only body and blood. And because it was only body and blood, what many people in the medieval church, and this certainly was something that kind of ran rampantly through the laity, they begin to worship these things. This is where the adoration of the host, and this is where you have a sense of the sacrament as almost an idol to be worshipped, not food to eat and drink. Well, a couple of things were happening practically in the church at that time. If it is only the blood of Christ, if it is spilled, this caused extraordinary anxiety among the priests. And even Luther is said to have gotten down on his knees and lapped up the wine that is also carrying the blood of Christ on the ground. And in some places, you'll even see where they've kind of marked out a place right there near the altar where nobody can stand because the blood was spilled there. Now, what's the best way to handle this? Well, for them the best way was just for them to take it away, to just remove it completely. And there's no danger of spilling it. Many of you, perhaps, aren't familiar with the fact that the most ancient way of receiving the host was in your hand. That�s how the early church did it. You received it in your hand and then you fed yourself. Well, what was happening during the medieval period, if this is only the body of Christ, people were receiving it in their hand. They were taking it home. They were putting it on their mantel in their homes, and they were worshiping it. Now, in order to prevent that from happening, what did they do? They put it right in the mouth, and as soon as it hit the mouth, of course, it begins to dissolve and people were less likely to take it out of their mouth. That's why the sacrament was given in the mouth. If you just think about the pastoral implications of that, there are some theological things going on there that need to be corrected. But you can see how this develops into a whole way of receiving the sacrament that goes on for probably one thousand years. Only recently in the Roman Catholic Church are people now receiving it in two kinds. And even now, it's not as common to receive it in two kinds as it is to just receive the host. Now, that's never been an issue in the Lutheran Church. But I do think we need to recognize how important the reception of the sacrament is and that receiving the sacrament is part of its use. It's part of the whole process. And so it's not just simply that there is a consecration where there is something present there. It's consecrated so that we may eat and drink it, and that is something I think still has significant pastoral ramifications today. Finally, I do want to say one more thing about some of the ways in which the laity did remain pious during this time. Here I think we need to be very gentle with the medieval church. I spoke about the rosaries and the relics, and the chapels and the novenas and the like. Sometimes, when the people of God, because of the nature of the church itself, are cut off from the means of grace, God provides ways for them to remain faithful and pious that may not be the most perfect ways, but are ways in which they do hear in their lives, to put it this way, have a glimpse of the gospel of Jesus Christ. That is not to say these are anything that we want to adopt or adapt to our own use. But I think as we read that history and we look at how pastors dealt with things at that time, we need to recognize that some of these things were very thoughtfully done. One thing I didn't mention is the idea of stained-glass windows. Stained-glass windows come into the church at this time because people are not hearing the stories of the faith. Many of them were illiterate, but even if they were able to read, they didn't have books to read the stories. They weren't hearing the stories because they didn't hear the word of God. So it was these beautiful stained-glass windows or the paintings in the church or the statues or the ways in which the church was adorned helped tell the story. And many of the pastors used these things to teach the basic fundamental foundations of the church's life and the biblical foundations of the basic stories of the Old and New Testament. These are things I think could have salutary effects for us. We need to use more visual things in our churches so that it's not just a religion of the mind, so that it's not just simply coming to us through our ears. But it's something that includes all our senses. This is something I'll address a little later on, but this is a good illustration of where, you know, again, there were some very pastoral and positive developments in the medieval church that we can learn from.